The half hour of "anticlimactic character summation" was both necessary (IMO), and considerably cut down from the book. What was the whole story about if not so Frodo and Sam could go back to the shire and live long full lives and so Aragorn could get the girl and become the king of Men? When you take into account that it is a 9 hour plus story, 30 minutes of epilogue isn't excessive.

Mark

And the sound was great on my system, btw.

"Shoot, a fella could have a pretty good weekend in Vegas with all that stuff"